2: Chocolate Box Girls: Marshmallow Skye (13 page)

18

The next Saturday, Cherry moves into her new bedroom. Mum and Summer have gone into town, for ballet-lesson and Christmas-shopping purposes respectively, and Coco is out in the workshop, helping Paddy with the chocolate orders, which are coming in faster than ever.

I make two mugs of steaming hot chocolate heaped with marshmallows and climb the little wooden ladder that leads up from our landing into the new attic bedroom, sticking my head through the hatch.

‘Hey!’ Cherry grins. ‘Skye! Come on up!’

Mum and Paddy have painted the walls pale yellow and put together an old iron bedstead they found in the attic space, with a new mattress and a feather duvet and the patchwork quilt from the caravan. There’s a stripy rag rug
on the sanded floorboards, a pine dressing table and a clothes rail Paddy has made himself from a length of broomstick.

The little attic windows are hung with Japanese
noren
door curtains with a geisha print, a parasol is suspended from the ceiling to serve as a lampshade and Cherry’s cool kimono is pinned to one wall. It looks awesome, and neat and tidy too, the kind of bedroom where you would never lose a bundle of hundred-year-old letters.

‘This room is the best!’ Cherry says, arranging her clothes on the broomstick rail and folding her socks and tights into a drawer. ‘It’s about a million miles away from my old room in Glasgow, I swear. I love the sloping walls and the little windows – if you stand right on tiptoes there’s actually a view of the sea in the distance!’

I set down the drinks and sink on to a floor cushion. ‘Fancy a hot chocolate break?’

‘Too right,’ Cherry grins, flopping down on to the bed. ‘How’s stuff with you then, Skye?’

‘Great,’ I say. ‘Well … mostly great.’

‘OK … so which bits aren’t?’

Where do I start? I can talk to my stepsister about most
things, but I’m not sure a crush on a long-dead gypsy boy is the kind of thing she’ll understand. I’d like to tell her about the dreams, but wouldn’t she think I was crazy?

I dig up something a little less unsettling to share.

‘Growing up is such a pain,’ I sigh. ‘Millie’s gone all weird, pretty much overnight – she’s so hung up on boys and make-up now. She treats me as if I’m some little kid these days.’

‘Sounds like she’s trying too hard,’ Cherry says. ‘D’you think she’s feeling a bit out of her depth?’

I frown. ‘Maybe. I don’t know – Millie has always jumped from one mad craze to another, but this one is really bugging me. Maybe I’m the one feeling out of my depth? This whole growing-up thing still feels kind of scary to me.’

‘You’re doing fine,’ Cherry says. ‘It’s not all about boys and make-up and short skirts – Millie will work that out sooner or later.’

‘I hope so,’ I sigh. ‘But it feels like we’re drifting apart, like she’d rather be with Summer. I mean, I can’t exactly blame her …’

There’s a sparkle about Summer, a shine, something that
attracts people and keeps them close, fluttering about her like moths round a flame. But does she really need another for her collection? Does she really need Millie?

‘Millie met up with Summer and Tia in town last weekend,’ I sigh. ‘She hasn’t even mentioned it … I only know because Summer told me. What if I’m losing her, Cherry? What if she’s bored with me?’

‘Trust me, nobody could ever be bored with you, Skye,’ Cherry says. ‘You’re one of the coolest people I know. But … well, you’ve been a bit distant, distracted, lately. Like you’re off in your own world the whole time. Maybe that’s the problem?’

I frown. Is it wrong to want to hide away in the past when the present is so uncertain, the future scary? I don’t think so.

‘Millie needs you,’ Cherry shrugs. ‘That whole town thing might have been a way of getting your attention, making you feel jealous even. Don’t throw a whole friendship away just because one of you is changing a bit. Work at it. I know what I’m talking about, Skye – I didn’t have any real friends until I came here, so I know how important it is. Don’t give up on Millie!’

I am not planning to give up on Millie, but sometimes I worry that she is giving up on me. I push the thought away, firmly.

‘Anyway,’ my stepsister grins. ‘You know where I am if you need to talk. I’m going to miss huddling into the caravan, though, even if it is a
lot
warmer in here!’

‘We can still use it as a meeting place, can’t we?’ I say, sipping the last of my hot chocolate.

‘Definitely,’ Cherry agrees. ‘Did you hear that Dad is going to paint up the caravan in time for the wedding? Charlotte wants to borrow a horse from the farm and drive it down to Kitnor Church instead of a wedding car!’

My eyes widen. ‘That would be so cool!’ I breathe. ‘We did take it down to the village once, years ago, for the Kitnor Food Fair.’

I lean back against the bed. A picture flashes into my mind, of our caravan, the same but different, crowded together with the others from my dream, down in the woods. Is it a dream, or an imagining, or a shadow from the past?

Clara’s letters have well and truly vanished, so I’ll probably never know.

‘Do you believe in ghosts?’ I ask suddenly, and Cherry looks up, startled.

‘Ghosts?’ she echoes.

‘Well, you know. Spirits from the past,’ I say, my cheeks pink. ‘Reaching out to the present somehow …’ I wasn’t going to talk about this, but Cherry’s a good listener, and how else am I going to puzzle out what the dreams mean?

A shadow crosses Cherry’s face. ‘No, I don’t believe in ghosts. If they existed, I think my mum would have found a way to reach me.’

I bite my lip. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

‘Oh, Cherry, I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have said anything.’

She sighs. ‘It’s OK. All that was a long time ago. I’ve accepted it now. But … funny question, Skye! Has something happened?’

‘Not really,’ I say. ‘It’s just that story about Clara, the gypsies … I can’t get it out of my head. Finding the trunk of clothes – well, it’s made it all seem so real.’

Cherry is listening carefully, and I wonder why I can tell her this when I can’t, daren’t, mention it to Summer. Is it because Summer would be frightened, furious? She’d probably make a bonfire of the dresses, so I’d have no link left
with Clara, with Finch. I can’t risk that. Or is it just that lately Summer and I seem to be drifting further and further apart?

I take a deep breath. ‘You said I seemed a bit distant, dreamy, lately … well, you’re probably right. I’ve been having these strange dreams, like snapshots of the past, fragments of memory … about the gypsies in the woods. It has to be linked with Clara, doesn’t it?’

Cherry considers. ‘It could just be your imagination,’ she says. ‘It’s such a sad story, and finding the trunk like that – perhaps your unconscious is filling in the details a little, trying to find a happy ending?’

I shrug. ‘It’s just – well, it feels like more than that. It feels as if I can’t let go, can’t step back.’

‘They’re dreams, though,’ Cherry says reasonably. ‘That’s not the same as actually seeing ghosts, is it?’

‘No … so, you don’t think there’s a reason for it then?’ I ask. ‘It’s not some kind of mystery I have to unravel? You know, like in those spooky movies you see where some ghost is lingering on because they want people to discover the truth about what really happened in the past? Because it feels a bit like that, sometimes.’

Cherry’s eyes are wide, concerned. ‘God, Skye … you think Clara’s trying to tell you something? Like … maybe she didn’t kill herself after all? Maybe she was … murdered? Scary!’

I shake my head. ‘No, I don’t think it’s anything like that. It’s not scary at all. I can’t explain. It doesn’t feel frightening or sinister, but … there must be something, surely? Some reason I can’t let go of it?’

Cherry looks troubled. ‘Clara’s story has really hit home for you,’ she says. ‘I can see that. But you can’t let it take over. Nobody’s trying to tell you stuff, and there is no mystery, you know that.’

‘Ignore me, I’m just being silly.’ I laugh, trying to lighten the mood. I don’t want Cherry to think I’m really losing it. ‘You’re right, I’ve let my imagination run away with me. Thanks for listening, Cherry – it doesn’t seem such a big deal any more. Just a couple of weird dreams.’

She nods and we let the subject go. There may be no such thing as ghosts, but as Mrs Lee said, there could be a whole lot of things out there we don’t yet understand.

All I know is that a boy called Finch has lodged himself inside my head, my heart – and I don’t want to let him go.

My stepsister is arranging stuff on her dressing table –
hairbrush, make-up, bodyspray and bracelets. She takes out a little photo of Shay and clips it to the side of the mirror, where she can see it every day.

‘Did you know, right from the start, with Shay?’ I ask. ‘That you liked him?’

Cherry rolls her eyes. ‘No way. I thought he was vain and arrogant and annoying. I thought Honey was welcome to him.’

‘What changed?’ I ask, curious now.

‘I got to know him,’ she sighs. ‘I tried and tried not to fall for him, Skye. I knew he was off-limits, but I couldn’t help it. I just couldn’t.’

‘Do you love him?’ I dare to ask.

Cherry’s cheeks flush pink. ‘I think so. I think I do.’

‘But … how do you know?’ I ask. ‘I mean … what does it feel like?’

Cherry shrugs. ‘I think about him all the time. I want to be with him. My heart races and the breath catches in my throat …’

She looks at me carefully. ‘Skye? Is there someone you like too?’

It’s my turn to blush. ‘There might be …’

‘That Alfie boy from Halloween? The one Summer’s been teasing you about?’ Cherry wants to know.

I laugh. ‘No, no, not Alfie. Definitely not Alfie … It’s complicated.’ I tell her.

Cherry smiles sadly.

‘It’s always complicated,’ she says.

19

We make our Christmas wish lists on little squares of coloured tissue paper, neatly writing down the things we’d like most in the world. It’s easy for Coco, who writes
a pony
in block capitals and then
riding lessons
;
a llama
;
a donkey
;
a parrot
. Cherry asks for things for her new room, like fairy lights and posters, and Summer asks for pointe shoes, which I know she has wanted forever and can finally actually use.

I find it harder to decide because the things I want are not actually things I can have. I have always felt this way, ever since the year Dad left and I realized I couldn’t write his name at the top of my Christmas list in case it upset Mum. So what do I want this year? To wear the velvet dresses from Clara’s trunk, to dream of Finch, to step back
in time and kiss him on the lips and see if it feels as good as when I dreamt it? I’m not sure Santa could sort that one.

I remember a gypsy-style shawl I spotted in a shop in Minehead, and write that down instead.

The others are still writing, but I abandon my list and raid the kitchen for supplies so that I can make marshmallow s’mores on the open fire. I warm marshmallows on the old toasting fork until they are golden, then sandwich them quickly between two chocolate digestives so that the marshmallow and the chocolate melt together in one perfect, soft-sweet smudge of biscuit and mallow fluff. Coco and Cherry pounce on them, but Summer wrinkles up her nose.

‘Must be about a million calories in those,’ she says. ‘Yuck.’

I stick my tongue out at her and bite into my s’more. Who cares about the calories when it tastes so good anyway?

Mum comes in with a couple of logs for the fire, which is probably just a sneaky way of taking a look at our wish lists.

‘That’s a very small list,’ she says when she sees mine. ‘Stuck for ideas?’

‘I don’t know what I want,’ I shrug, although that’s not
strictly true. ‘Something vintage, something cool. I don’t know. A surprise, I guess.’

‘Fair enough,’ Mum says.

I pick up my list, still trying to make the marshmallow sweetness last, and in the corner of the paper, I draw a picture of a little bird, small and neat with a gently forking tail, an image that has started appearing all over my notebooks lately, all over my heart.